


Sleeves

by sleazy_c



Category: Labyrinth (1986)
Genre: F/M, Old Age, Sarah is a good sister, Toby is a good brother, ain't even witnessed, past relationship, technically
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-26
Updated: 2020-09-28
Packaged: 2021-03-02 20:40:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,355
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24392929
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sleazy_c/pseuds/sleazy_c
Summary: Sarah didn’t consider herself an overly sentimental person.
Relationships: Jareth/Sarah Williams, Sarah Williams/OC
Comments: 17
Kudos: 49





	1. one

**Author's Note:**

> you ever think about the ending of titanic? you ever imagine the ending of titanic, but with a children's movie from the eighties? i do.

Sarah didn’t consider herself an overly sentimental person.

At least, not in her adult life. During her adolescence, she had, near-compulsively, hoarded things which reminded her of her happier childhood. She’d kept stories, toys, and clippings of her mother’s Broadway appearances, trying to preserve that period of life when things were less complicated; when her parents were still together, when she was the only child, when she’d had the creative and imaginative environment she craved. Then, seemingly overnight, she had changed. All of her childhood toys and needless costumes were donated or discarded.

Not to say she became a minimalist. No, Sarah still kept tchotchkes and knickknacks. Her decorating habits tended towards the fantastical, but she still recycled her old decor in favor of new, and never had more than was reasonable. She even continued constructing and obtaining costumes, though this was later in life, when she went to college and learned how to be a theater teacher. She was the number one source of the contents of her students’ _(or her "goblins," as she’d called them)_ prop room, giving a new use to many of her items without one.

It wasn’t as if she didn’t want these things; she had an eye like a magpie, her late husband used to tell her. Her ability to discover little trinkets was ironically uncanny. Little rings, figurines, clear crystalline marbles, she found them all around. She’d even, in her forties, opened her front door to find a clunky plastic bracelet sat on her welcome mat. The bracelet had triggered something in her memory, to the point where she’d even put in on and worn it for several hours before deciding that her youngest niece would enjoy it and taking it off, soon forgetting the whole debacle.

All of these odds and ends she would leave where she found them, or give to others. Her many nieces and nephews, her husband, and her students would be the recipients of her gifts from the universe. She would even tease her husband for his habit of collecting little keepsakes. He, in turn, had teased her for the single trinket which she _had_ kept.

With the thought of her singular treasure in mind, Sarah quietly slid out of bed. She withheld the groan of pain that wanted to escape, trying not to wake Toby. He had nodded off in the armchair by the opposite bedside, and Sarah knew that he needed all the rest he could get. 

When her health had taken a turn for the worse several months ago, Toby had taken it far harder than anyone else had. Their parents had died many years ago, and Sarah had no children. Toby’s full nest of children, on the other hand, had already all grown up, and he saw no reason not to step up and be Sarah’s primary caretaker. Sarah felt that he himself, at sixty-five, was too old to try and single-handedly care for his older sister, but he was a persistent man, and Sarah, in the end, had felt too guilty to deny him this one comfort.

“You used to babysit me,” he’d told her with a waiver in his voice. “Now _I’ll_ babysit _you._ ”

Sarah had scoffed, gently swatting him on the arm. “You’ll have to change significantly fewer diapers than I did.”

After struggling for a moment to put on her house slippers, she’d shuffled into the hallway. Lining the hall were photographs of her numerous nieces and nephews, as well as her students. Since her diagnosis, many of them had come to visit, some even helping with her caretaking. (It seems they had gotten over their grudge of having her be so tough in class.)

Towards the end of the hall, across from the closet which was her destination, hung a picture of her and her husband dancing on their wedding day. He wore a navy suit, with his long hair pulled into a low ponytail. He had been an older man, in his mid-thirties when they met after Sarah had graduated from college. This had always caused tension between her husband and her father, but their relationship had been as pleasant as any she could imagine. The stars didn’t align when they kissed or anything, but he had been kind and supportive, and they had been best friends until his death. With his blond locks and sharp cheek-bones, he had always reminded her of someone, but she could never quite remember who.

_“Is it David Bowie?” he’d asked her once. “I’ve gotten that a couple of times.”_

_“No,” she’d responded. “That’s close, but not who I’m thinking of.”_

In the picture, she was wearing a sleeveless ball gown. Of the ones she’d tried on, it had been her favorite, but something about it wasn’t quite the way she wanted. Now, Sarah smiled in fond remembrance before turning to her closet.

It was a linen closet, and the middle shelf was usually full of blankets. They had since been relocated to Sarah’s bedroom, due to her illness frequently manifesting in her feeling frozen. The blank shelf, then, showed the old shoe box hidden at the back. With arthritis-swollen hands, Sarah grabbed the shoe box and held it to her chest before closing the door and moving back towards her bedroom. She settled back in the bed, not bothering to take off her slippers. Even the short walk to the closet and back had worn her out. 

With Toby quietly snoring from the armchair, Sarah sat the shoebox in her lap and lifted the lid off. Inside, on a bed of newspaper, lay a music box she’d had since childhood. It had a hexagonal base, with a doll wearing a ballgown under a pointed cover. When it was cranked, the doll would spin while music played. For some reason she couldn’t explain, this was the only thing she’d ever kept from her youth. The idea of giving it away broke her heart.

Exhaustion was creeping in. Sarah lifted the music box from its bed and moved the shoe box to the bedside table. She grabbed the crank and wound it until it was at its limit. When she released it, the music played just like it had over sixty years ago. Inexplicably, tears started leaving her eyes. She placed the music box beside her and reclined in her bed, ready for sleep. She looked to the ceiling, her tears blurring her vision.

“Everything’s dancing,” she said, and promptly lost consciousness.

*

When Sarah woke up, she was in the bedroom she’d had when she was sixteen.


	2. two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Well, old girl,_ she thought to herself, _it took eighty years, but you’ve finally lost it._

When Sarah woke up, she was in the bedroom she’d had when she was sixteen.

She sat up quickly, without noticing that there was no pain in her back for the first time in twenty years, and took in her surroundings. All of her children’s books had returned. She saw crowns, and grease-paint makeup, and a stuffed dog with an eyepatch. But there, on her vanity, was her music box, still spinning and playing that same mournful tune.

Sarah gasped and put her hand to her mouth, noticing three things in quick succession: first, her hands were free of wrinkles; second, her other hand was wrapped around a stuffed animal ( _Lancelot_ ) she hadn’t seen since before she went to college; and third, covering the back of her hand, and trailing up her arm, was the sleeve of a heavily-beaded and highly-reflective gown. Looking down, she saw that the gown was large enough to cover her entire bed, a bed that was twin-sized. Sarah tumbled out of bed as gracefully as she could wearing an immense ball gown and ran to her vanity to take in her reflection.

 _Well, old girl,_ she thought to herself, _it took eighty years, but you’ve finally lost it._

She was looking at the face of a young woman. Her face, yes, but her face as it hadn’t looked since she was twenty. Her hair was _dark,_ not a touch of gray in sight, and large enough to match the enormous skirt. Turning her gaze down, she saw that her left hand, still clenching the stuffed bear, no longer bore her wedding ring. She lifted the skirt of her dress to look at her legs, which were free of varicose veins, and her feet, which were wearing flat brown moccasins that didn’t match the dress at all.

Her eyes returned to the mirror. She backed up a bit to take in the fill view. It was familiar, but Sarah didn’t think she’d ever worn this before in her life. The skirt was wide enough to be cut off by the edges of the mirror. The bodice was well-fitted to a waist that Sarah didn’t remember _ever_ having been so small. But what enchanted her the most were the sleeves. The tops were puffed abnormally large, and dipped inward at the middle, making them look almost like butterfly wings. When she spun around, they expanded even more, making Sarah giggle.

Something was ringing a bell in her head, but she didn’t know what. Something about this felt so _comfortable,_ so _familiar,_ but she was struggling to find out what. She had never had a dream so realistic. Sarah didn’t even recall the last dream that she had _remembered,_ but this seemed like one from her youth, come back to her again all these years later.

She was pulled from her thoughts when the music box in front of her ceased its music. The doll inside was facing towards her, like a smaller-scale version of herself. _No wonder this dress is so familiar._ Though the music from the box had stopped, she could now hear different music, distantly, coming from her door. Sarah turned to face it, now feeling the beginnings of unease. It wasn’t clear what, exactly, this dream was going towards. She moved to her bedroom door after setting Lancelot on the vanity, and grabbed the handle, before stopping.

Sarah closed her eyes. _Why does this feel so damned familiar?_ Her hand clenched around the knob, and she considered willing herself to wake up. _Am I able to wake myself back up? Do I_ want _to wake myself back up?_

Suddenly, though, Sarah remembered one thing which comforted her. _You have no power over me._ She opened her eyes, then opened the door.

Before her, there was a long stone hallway. This was definitely not a part of her home when she was sixteen. Candles lined the walls around the height of Sarah’s chin, and they had wax stalactites reaching almost to the floor. Sarah expected it to be cold, but she felt no distinct change in temperature from her room to the hall. She stepped into the hall, or, at least, she tried, but her bustle got caught on the door. Sarah laughed out loud at herself, effectively breaking any tension she had felt. She stepped back, and went through again at an angle.

Once she was fully in the hallway, she turned back to look into her room, only to find that the door was gone. This, surprisingly enough, did not scare Sarah one bit. Where the door had been, there was now a large window, looking out onto a seemingly vast hedge maze. It was almost night-time outside, and she could only see a vague imprint past the first several rows.

Reorienting herself towards where she could face the direction of the music, Sarah followed down the hall, where it opened into a large chamber. This chamber was filled with stairs, like an M. C. Escher drawing she used to have hung on her wall. For a moment, she was worried that she wouldn’t be able to find her way towards the music. She bit her lip before noticing that there was a trail of confetti in front of her. Sarah lifted her skirts so as not to trip, and began following the confetti up the first flight of stairs. Once she’d followed for a short while, Sarah looked back, seeing that the confetti led in a completely different direction than she had come from. When she saw, in the distance, that the confetti was littered across an upside-down set of stairs on the ceiling of the chamber, Sarah said, “Huh.” She turned back towards her destination, following the confetti into another hallway now. “What the hell did Toby feed me?”

This hallway began at the average height, but as she traversed it, Sarah observed that it gradually got higher, leading to great doors that she was concerned she wouldn’t be able to open. But the music was now louder than ever, and she realized that a big wave of excitement had been building in her since she woke up here, and it was ready to crash. Hands shaking, she reached for the handles on the doors, ( _do hands usually shake in dreams?_ ) and pulled them open.

Beyond the doors was an enormous dance hall, filled to the brim with... people? Well, _some_ of them were people, Sarah observed. Some were much smaller, and a few others were larger, and these, upon further investigation, didn’t seem like people at all. She was reminded of _Where the Wild Things Are_ , a book she was quite certain she had seen back in her bedroom, for these creatures, large and small alike, certainly appeared to be Wild Things. There were great beasts, furred and with elaborate horns. There were little gray-skinned beasts with helmets as well as suit-jackets breezing between the legs of others who were bigger. She saw fox-like creatures in a far corner, juggling with what seemed to be hands, and she quickly looked away. When she looked down, there was something akin to a pangolin with a long beard and wearing a vest walking past her skirt.

The people, or at least the creatures similar to people, were all adorned with elaborate masks, and dressed in either androgynous pirate garb or victorian gowns. They took up most of the dancing body, and they, as well as the other beasts, were all mirthful and merry. The room around them, which was the last thing Sarah took in in the face of such fantasy, was decked in elegant swaths of silk fabric, large candelabras, and pearl beads draping from the ceiling to the tables. Some of the little goblins were sitting on the suspended silk, and the orange fox-things had, apparently, set one on fire in a controlled destruction.

The pangolin was the first to notice her. He looked up at Sarah, gasped, and turned a 180 before running with a purpose straight across the dance floor. Others seemed to hear him, and looked her way. When they saw her, they only paused for a moment, then split the dance floor like the Red Sea, revealing a path for Sarah to use while continuing to dance.

_Well, at least someone was expecting my arrival. I sure wasn’t._

After a moment’s hesitation, Sarah began crossing the parted section of the floor, her dress collecting residue confetti which covered the entirety of the dance hall. Occasionally, a creature she passed would bow to her, and she, out of a sense of politeness, would curtsy in turn. She had made it about half-way across the floor when she noticed a great many of the revelers were facing up to her left, where there was a previously-unnoticed platform with a staircase.

On that platform stood a man, and when Sarah moved from behind a chandelier, she saw him, and she gasped, and she remembered.

_Jareth_


	3. three

_Jareth_

Sarah felt light-headed, and stumbled back. When she regained her footing, she whipped her head around her, taking in everything that suddenly made sense to her. Fireys, goblins, fairies, they surrounded her, and they were _real_.

(Or, if nothing else, the products of the most elaborate dream she’d had in her eighty years of living.)

“The castle beyond the Goblin City,” she murmured, almost too quiet for even herself to hear over the sound of music that was still playing. It wasn’t clear where the music was coming from, but Sarah felt it was inappropriate that it still be playing while she was in the midst of a damn revelation.

The trigger of her revelation, the man, _Jareth_ , started walking down the stairs, then, snapping Sarah out of her paralysis. He had a mask that she remembered with crystalline clarity. His entire outfit, in fact, was burned into her brain from that ball so long ago. Even though it had been well over sixty years since she’d seen him, she was able to recognize how typical it was of him to dramatically stroll down the staircase at a leisurely pace, and she nervously giggled for a moment when he’d reached the ballroom floor.

At his landing, a respectful bow swept through the revelers like a wave, which Jareth, surprisingly enough, returned. He straightened, and removed his mask, which in the blink of an eye turned to a bubble and floated to the high ceiling. Sarah didn’t witness its entire journey, though, because Jareth had begun gliding across the floor toward her through the part of the partygoers. As he passed, they came back together, returning to their own interactions and dancing again.

Sarah’s heartbeat increased exponentially as he made long strides across the floor. By the time he was within three feet of her, she worried she would faint. Instinctually, Sarah curtsied towards the Goblin King, and he bowed to Sarah.

At his full height again, Jareth had that enigmatic smile on his face that infuriated her as a child. Now, though, she just smiled back, unable to withhold her childlike wonder at being here, in front of him. He extended a gloved hand towards her, and asked, “May I have this dance?”

While Sarah’s heart had returned to a normal pace, it threatened to rise again at the sound of that voice, musical and like none other she’d ever heard. “Yeah,” her voice creaked out. She cleared her throat, tried again, “Yes, you may.” She laid her hand in Jareth’s, and stepped into his embrace. He was still smirking, those unsettling eyes of his alight with mirth. Sarah could feel her cheeks fully flush, and then he began leading her in a dance.

She was surprised to find the moves coming to her so easily, though that was hardly the least believable thing happening tonight. Her hands flexed against thick shoulder patches and skin-warmed leather gloves. Jareth’s breath was warm against her forehead. He smelled like cedar, and his presence felt like the air before a summer storm. While they swirled across the floor, Sarah’s eyes just kept jumping across his face, remembering all of the details, shocking herself with how much she recalled from such little time together.

After several minutes of dancing, Sarah spoke up, “I’m surprised to see you repeating an outfit; you don’t seem like the type.”

Jareth let out a chuckle at this, caught off-guard by her sudden speech. “Well, Sarah, I thought it would be easier on you if your surroundings were recognizable. I took that into mind with the decoration, as well as my appearance.”

Sarah’s eyebrows rose in disbelief. “That seems pretty considerate of you. I’m shocked.”

“I’ve always tried to be considerate of you, Sarah,” he responded with a theatrical pout.

“Oh have you?” She rebutted, leaning away a bit so she could more effectively give him a questioning face. “Like stealing my brother? And my memories? And dropping me into a landfill?” Sarah stayed calmer than she expected during this, not feeling any malice rather than a low-level annoyance.

Jareth’s eyes left hers for the first time. “You asked me to take your brother,” he said, almost mumbled. If he had the ability to blush, Sarah realized, he would be. She gave him a knowing smile. “Anyway, I meant after you’d left me.”

Her eyebrows had never gotten such a workout in her life, she was sure of it. On the tail-end of her confusion, she felt a small pang of guilt for having left, which was _ridiculous_ and she knew it. Returning to the confusion, “What do you mean after? I haven’t seen you in sixty years.” Having mentioned her age, she felt a little embarrassed before realizing that Jareth must be older still. _How old is he?_

“You haven’t, no,” he agreed, sweeping her around the dance floor with the grace of untold years of practice. “I have visited you, though, many times.”

Sarah gazed at him, silent, waiting for him to elaborate.

“Once you’d gone, I found myself rather… upset by my behavior. I very well couldn’t blame you for leaving, Sarah.” He was quiet for a moment, spinning Sarah out, pulling her back in. She realized that they were nearly whispering to each other. “I decided I would seek your forgiveness, though I knew you wouldn’t remember my transgressions. Which,” he rushed in when she opened her mouth to ask, “was not my doing. It is simply the way of humans leaving this place.

“So, I left you gifts. Trinkets, odds and ends, things of the sort.” His chest puffed a bit in a peacock-like way, which she found endearing instead of obnoxious. “I even returned your plastic thing.”

Sarah thought of the rings and marbles, of her _bracelet_. Blushing, she said, “I didn’t realize they were gifts. I gave most of them away.”

Jareth shook his head. “That isn’t important. Only that it made you happy.”

Sarah bit her lip to hide her smile.

They spent another few minutes just dancing. Sarah couldn’t tell when the songs ended and when the next ones began; they seemed to bleed into each other without any fanfare. The king seemed to know them, though, for he hummed along to each one. She found herself wishing that he would sing to her.

“I would try to help you at times, as well,” he said, bringing her back from her thoughts. “I don’t have much control out there, but I would do little things. I led that handsome chap you married to the place where you first met.”

That surprised a laugh out of her. “Now that, I don’t believe.”

Jareth shook his head again, “It’s true. I gave you a gift on your wedding day, even.”

Sarah looked down, trying to remember what he could have possibly given her, trying to call his bluff. It had been so long ago.

His hand left her waist, lifting to touch her just in the dip of her clavicle. She drew in a sharp breath. “You’re wearing it now, in fact.” His finger caught the golden chain of a necklace whose charm was hidden beneath her dress. He drew it out until the charm was in his palm, and she could see it.

A small, crystal peach, with a bite taken out of it. She moved her hand from his shoulder, taking the peach from his hand, which he replaced above her hip. “This was from you?” She rolled the peach in her hand, remembering now how puzzled she’d been after her wedding upon opening this gift, which bore no tag. It was her favorite necklace, right up until the point where she no longer wore jewelry. It had been in her vanity back home not an hour ago. She already felt like she’d been here for years.

Sniffing, she allowed the necklace to fall back against her dress. Her hand went back to his shoulder. “So,” she began, “why am I here?” She had yet to feel tired, though they had been dancing for quite a while. The rest of the party was still going full-swing, a conga line of little goblin-soldiers weaving across the room.

Jareth subtly pulled her closer to him, the hand at her waist relocating to the small of her back. “I’m inviting you to stay again.” Sarah was so shocked, she stopped dancing. “In my kingdom. With me.” His hand which had been holding hers pulled them towards his chest. This was the closest they’d ever been.

“Why?” Sarah’s voice was hardly more than a whisper.

“You’ve reached the end of your time where you were.” He paused. “You may go on, or you may stay here.”

Sarah was gobsmacked. She wasn’t scared, or upset. She’d known that she didn’t have much longer left to live, but the fact that she was dying tonight was a bit of a suckerpunch. “What happens if I don’t stay?”

Jareth shrugged, a motion that Sarah never thought she would’ve seen on him. “I only know what happens here.” His eyes, so strange and beautiful, never wavered from hers. “Things are very different in my land than they were when you were young. I believe you could be happy here.”

Sarah considered for a moment. Translucent streamers fluttered in the side of her vision. High windows in the ballroom revealed a sky of stars, constellations she had never seen. Here was magic, here was laughter, here was wonder.

Turning back to Jareth, she asked, “And what if I wanted to leave?”

He sighed. His thumb stroked hers where it lay against his chest. “Then you leave.”

A small smile grew on Sarah’s face. “Will I have to fear you, love you, and do what you say?”

Jareth let out a huff of a laugh. “You have never, and would never fear me, Sarah. I think the same can be said for doing as I say.”

She swallowed. “And what about loving you?”

Jareth’s eyes dropped to the peach necklace. “That will be up to you.” He released her hand, moving his to cup her face, the white leather of his glove warm and soft. “Me being your slave, though, is non-negotiable.”

A laugh was shocked out of her. The hand on Jareth’s chest flattened out, fingers spreading. “Such a pity,” Sarah said, rising onto her toes to kiss him. The stars aligned, and Jareth let out a breath, collapsing into the kiss in a way that was very unbecoming of royalty.

*

Somewhere in the home of Toby Williams, a music box began playing.


End file.
